shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiipppppppppppppp!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

played a bunch last night, got deep in the 8pm $27.50 on stars but got bounced 21st when 55 lost to A8o ai pre. also was hu for a seat the $250 2day ftops event and lost A5 vs Jx or something. did win a seat to the fifty fifty but unregistered because i was getting killed in most of my early tournies and didn't want to start another one.

was pretty bummed, been getting deep a lot but no big scores no matter final tables. had plans to play tonight but then said naw screw it, bunch of good sports on tv, then changed my mind, changed it again and finally sat down to play around 9pm but wasn't too motivated. reg'd for about 7 tournies i think including the fifty fifty w/ my T$.

8 hours later.


















holla!

tg

in the hole

so i've been getting beat up pretty good in the omaha 8 games on ftp. mostly 3/6 has annihilated me and i've been breaking even at 2/4. to be honest though, i've been playing horribly and probably deserve the result. while my pre-flop hand selection is coming along my post flop play has been abysmal and i have been spewing hard. last night was the first session where i actually buckled down and started folding some hands post flop and i think i plugged one very large leak in which i was overplaying mediocre high hands multi-way when the flop has brought a low or a low draw.

anyways, i have a new kind of outlook on my poker game and that is "while i have more knowledge and skill than your average poker joe, i by no means have god given talent for cards and have to work relentlessly at improving my game in order to be a winner. And after all that, i'll never be as good as i can be and will never reach a point where i can rest on my laurels."

pretty deep.

so in my omaha 8 learning curve i've set a few rules:

1. only play 2/4
2. no more playing short handed, once a game breaks below 4 players i'll probably sit out.
3. no more playing while i'm multi-tabling mtt's.

this and i also started keeping my holdem manager open while playing and reviewing key pots on the side as soon as i played them. this helps me get a better grasp on equities and what edges i should be pushing and where i might be spewing. ideally i would like to take time away from the tables to do post game analysis but my poker time is pretty limited so i'm going to go ahead with analyzing on the fly.

i'll also look to focus on my mtt tables and will only mix in omaha tables when im down to 2 or 3 tabling mtt's. playing 6 tables with a mixture just seems to disorientate me and i end up ignoring the mtt tables and am trying to follow action on the omaha tables.

played a few mtt's last night and went deep in an $11 20k guarantee on stars but busted 41st/2700ish when i re-stole a button open w/ KJs in the sb and villain made a good call w/ A9o about 20bb deep.

im pretty hungry for some mtt success, even a final table but haven't been able to do much. it's partly due to the lack of tourny's i can play though as i usually register for everything up to $35 buy-ins and under between 7pm and 8pm. this usually gives me 3 or 4 tourny's on stars and 1 on ftp although my pleas to ftp have seemed to work and they added a $11 15k guarantee at 7pm. this is great except for 1 thing, it's a superstack tourny which gives slower structure and more chips which im all in favor for but the tourny gets like 2700 runners and from what i can tell, runs 10 hours. this means that if i were to final table, i'd be up till 5am on a day that i have leave for work a mere 2 hours later. now the top prize last night was like 4.7k which is very good for a $11 mtt but you could essentially play for 9 hours and final table only to make like $300. kinda not worth it to me.

so thats about it, i've been splitting my away from the table time to watching mtt vids and reading a bunch of o8 material along with re-reading the Ray Zee hi lo split for advanced players book.

let's hope something good materializes.

tg

variety

so been keeping busy playing my usual schedule of mtt's. nothing to report other than i keep getting inside the final 10% of these large stars tournies only to bust out well ahead of the final table. this means a lot of week nights when i play im up till 1am when i have to get up and work the next morning. it's well worth it when you pocket a couple months of salary but cashing for $50 puts a little extra sting in the ear when the alarm goes off.

i did make some attempts at mass tabling some super turbo sngs on ftp and did alright. i think the best i got up to was 8 at a time although i had tried it out first playing a 16 tables of 1c/2c frnl. the ahk scripts def help but i felt like a total robot. i think 9 tabling tiled is prob the best way although stacking tables def has it's benefits.

last week when i was 1 tabling a deep finish i popped open a limit 08 game and played a bit. of all the games it just unbelievable how juicy those games still are. like even razz is played fairly well now and people know when to steal and when to donk out when their opponent bricks. o8 though, any 4 will do, any 2 pair is getting shown down for hi when a low is out and any 2 cards that have made a low is paying off.

it's funny, i really like the game when it's shorthanded and i can play a lot looser. i took a crack at playing it earlier in the year but was playing like 2 tables of full ring and just got bored stiff. it was recently that i watched some danzasmack o8 vids on deucescracked that i started to see spots where i can open it up, especially since a lot of the o8 games seem to break down to 3 or 4 handed at times and players just don't have a clue how to adjust.

i've ground out a couple hundo winner over only like 1k hands of mostly 2/4 with some 1/2 and 3/6 but it's been fun and a change of pace and it also generates some good rakeback which i've noticed is something that mtt's just don't provide. the real test will be what happens when i start losing.

stay tuned...

sngs

haven't played much at all due to traveling and being busy. played a small session saturday night and went deep in the stars 25k busting 13th out of a 1300 person field. my bust out hand was pretty standard but i think i may have made a couple errors late that probably didn't affect the outcome but need to be revisited. i won a 45 man turbo on stars and cashed in a turbo 180 which are both pretty cool sngs and i hope ftp will add them too.

in order to work on my push/fold shorter stack play i've also decided to play sng's again. i believe they're a great companion to playing mtt's and will also help fill in the tables when i may be down to 1 or 2 tabling multi's. i experimented the other day playing 12 tables on ftp and it wasn't that hard. i downloaded a ahk script program that helps so i think i will start grinding away at those a bit more to improve my ss game, help provide a little stability to my roll and grind out some rakeback.

tg

first month of mtt's

so since my last post nothing too much has happened. i've had one final table, in the ub $66 which gets around 250 runners i think (only thu-sun i believe) and finished 6th for $850ish.

that was at the beginning of the month, then i went on like 0/20 streak with zero cashes and since then i've been cashing but getting bounced after that. i had one deep run where i bubbled the final table getting 10th/1735 in a $3r that i played for fun. i ran like god though and kept getting coolered and then sucking out to stay alive.

i've played a bunch of the 45's on ftp but haven't had any success to speak of. i was deep in a few things the other night when i got a phone call and started spewing horribly in anything cuz i wasn't concentrating, i ended up making a huge -ev shove in a tier 2 18man sng where there was 6 left, 5 getting $75 tokens and 6th getting $57 cash. i had about 7.5bb and was sitting about 3/6 and i look down at KTs, shove then see that the bb is the only one with over 10bb and he has like 30bb. i was like ah fuck what an idiot, then i notice that the sb only has 1.5bb so now i know the bb will spite call me, he does w/ 98o and sends me to the rail. i then spewed off my stack in a 180 when i was 1/20 and finished 15th.

blah.

joined back up at pxf, also had a coaching session with an mtt coach that was good and have been brushing up a lot on my push/fold and raise/call vs raise/fold vs shove stuff.

tg

triumphant return!

so after about a 2 week hiatus of literally no poker i started to get a little excited again. excited about playing tournaments no less.

here are my thoughts on making the switch back to mtt's, again:

• 90% of my poker profit comes from mtt's
• i just don't seem to have the drive and focus to be a winning cash player
• mtt's give a sense of general excitement and aniticipation
• mtt's are actually not that bad for my schedule, since going to cash games i generally burn out real fast during sessions and end up not playing very much where as i can sit down, fire up a bunch of tournies between 7-8pm, play them out and if im done early im done early or if im up late so be it.
• tournaments are still extremely soft (with a few exceptions) where as cash games as low as .25/.50 players are becoming much more adept.
• lastly and this a big one, when i play cash games there is a certain ceiling that i can hit when winning. this ceiling is rather low because my table time is restricted and i can only efficiently 4 table. so even if i got to the point where i was top 2/4 reg, i'd still only be making a couple grand a month which is awesome but at the end of the day, seems like an awful lot of work for some extra cash. with mtt's, i can score big anytime i sit down. if i sattelite into a big event i have a (albeit very slight) chance of having a 6 figure score which to me at this point is potentially life changing.

so with all that said i sat down last night and fired up the following:

• $11 - 20k guaranteed on stars
• $11, 1r1a on stars
• $22 180 man sng
• $27.50 8pm on stars
• $26 8pm guarantee on ftp
• 2 $26 45 man sngs on ftp

at the end of the night i cashed 4/7, winning the 180 man sng for 1.08k, both 45 sngs for 800ish and had a small cash in the 1r1a.

after buy-ins i think it was a 1.78k night and i had a total blast. i admittedly ran pretty hot and got super lucky in the one 45. i felt very rusty and im sure alot of my push / fold play was sub par but i can work on that. i've been studying up on some videos of late and also looking at some potential coaching just to get me sharp again.

glad to be back playing donkaments.

tg

not wanting to play

for some reason last week i just lost all motivation to play poker. like i could care less right now about watching training vids or playing at all.

it's really weird, im generally super excited to play and can't wait for my next session but right now i have no want for it.

i was going to sit down and play anyways figuring i would get into it after a little while but have decided against that. i think i'll just take some time away from the game and come back refreshed. (hopefully)

right now im pondering a return to mtt's but we'll see.

tg

jokerstars

played for the first time in a while last night and stars handed me my ass dropping $350 in like 500 hands. makes the grand total for the month like -1.1k over very few hands. yuck.

didn't bet any of the UFN fights last nite although i liked one fight but didn't pull the trigger.

just bet a couple golf futures for this weekend, bit of a whim but i like both guys and they're both due in a small 30 man field.

J. Furyk +1802 - 1u
G. Ogilvy +3504 - 1u

gotta go finish handicapping this weeks nfl and maybe even look at some more bets on this weekends ufc card.

tg

switched to stars

finally fed up with ftp enough to leave and go to stars. early on it's been really tough getting used to and i decided to go on uber monkey play mode and donate like $850 playing 100nl. since then i started reviewing my hh's again and focusing more when i play and it feels like things are coming back.

really haven't played much though, only a couple thousand hands.

i also moved some money onto a couple of different online sports books so that i could bet some nfl and mma. i've settled on betting in units of $10 and so far am taking a very cautious approach to it. im trying not to just bet hunches, instead going with sound reasoning and only picking a few spots where i really like a side. i don't expect to be uber successful at it but it will be a fun experience and i know i'll have a better chance at making a little money doing it rather than betting long shot parlays and futures.

i've bet 2 mma fights already for ufc103, they are:

• vitor belfort over rich franklin +129
• mirko cro cop over junior dos antos +116

other than that there are no real mma bets i like this month. i may bet josh koscheck over frank trigg but i'll wait and see if the line moves at all. koscheck is a virtual guarantee to win imo.

in nfl, i went for 3/3 in my first week:

• Seattle laying 7.5 to St.Louis (they won 28-0)
• Atlanta laying 4 to Miami (they won 19-7)
• Tennessee getting 6.5 to Pittsburgh (they lost 13-10)

for nfl i will probably only be betting a few games a week for the first 4-5 weeks until i get a better sense of where everyone is at.

tg

random junk

so i played one last session before i went on vaca, was up 700 to stuck 450 to up 100 to stuck 500 to finish up 230.

went on vaca for a while and didn't play much upon on my return. went back to losing a little bit each session but nothing major. all my sessions last week were super short but frequent so that explains it. then on friday i had a really quick session and won like 350 in 15 minutes.

then i withdrew 1k to cover some expenses so i was down to about a 6k roll online. got to thinking about how each sessions results has been affecting my mood and how im kinda rollercoasting with only 2-3 buyin swings and what it comes down to is being under rolled for 200nl.

so for that reason i decided to drop down to 100nl again and played a session there on monday where i was crushing it before my computer went apeshit and started crashing repeadetly. overall i made like 250 in a couple hundred hands.

i think im gonna grind there for a bit, at least till i have an 8k roll but maybe even more. so far in my 200nl shot taking im only up like 3 buyins over like 22k hands or something for a pretty small winrate. i feel i have a good edge in those games but 100nl is even softer so i should have no problem there.

this month i ended up down like 180 i think but who knows if my computer didn't crash out. couldn't play last night cuz it really crashed, may play tonite if i can get it fixed in time. im also back to the brink of being done with ftp and if i can find a reasonable route of getting money off there and onto pstars i think i will forego the ease and luxury of cash rakeback for the pastures of great customer support, top class run business and overall less stressful atmosphere than that of ftp.

a shame really since i used to love that site.

tg

losing streak

have lost my last 4 sessions so that's 8 in a row now. yuck.

it's not that bad though as over the whole 8 sessions im only down like 11 buy-ins and fortunately i started the month up 7 buy-ins quick. it's easy to go on a stretch like this because my sessions are usually very small (hand wise) with a session usually consisting of 500-1k hands.

feel like I've been playing pretty good of late, just running into spots where it appears villains have the nuts and im near the top of my range but not beating what they're repping.

im going away on vaca for the week starting tomorrow so unless i get some hands in tonight i probably won't play again till Saturday.

tg

early august

have been playing a decent amount so far this month. most of my action has come at the 1/2nl deep w/ ante tables. these games have been by far the most aggressive games i've ever seen no matter played in. the amount of 3-betting / 4-betting / 5-betting pre-flop is just gross and every pot that is eligible will be squeezed regardless of positions and player types. the games are full of regs with the occasional fish or nit but for the most part it's just regs battling and stacking off 200bb deep w/ cheese.

the games are incredibly fun to play in but i believe i will stop playing them because a) the variance is insane and b) i may be a dog in most line-ups as i think a few 400nl regs are the mainstays in the games and are down at 200nl while learning adjustments for the ante games.

i will say that i have learned one very important thing of late though and that is not all tag/lag regs are created equal. i generally tag a player as a tough reg after i see his preflop stats after a 100 hands or so but lately as i'm getting better at hand reading and evaluating ranges i'm seeing some of the better players making pretty terrible mistakes. not that i don't make some really bad mistakes myself but i've generally felt that if you played 23/19 preflop and were a 400nl reg you were awesome at poker. true most people including myself have a decently solid pre-flop game but post flop is where the skill is and im starting to identify the tag fish when i see them. (as well as stop acting like one myself cuz i def am)

so anyways, i had a good start to the month following up a that $370 session with a 1k winning session but since then it's been $425, $415, $625 and $50 losing sessions. this puts me at slight loser for the month which is fine since it's only swinging 7-8 buyins which is normal. the first losing session i played pretty poorly and was unfocused for most of the session but i believe i've played a lot better since then and just haven't gotten the results.

funny enough the $50 loss tilted me after i was done the session because i saw that i was up about 700 playing pretty well, winning lots of small to medium sized pots before getting stacked twice and losing a couple of other good sized pots. i know for a fact though if i wasn't playing well this little losing stretch would have probably looked more like a 15 buyin downswing so hooray for not being a total fish.

short term plan is just to stick to the regular 200nl games and only play the ante tables when the game is soft. while enjoyable, the ante games are playing too tough right now to justify playing in them over a typical soft 200nl table.

tg

edit: oh yeah, also played 2 of my biggest pots in recent memory, once getting my TT in vs KK on a T42 flop over 300bb deep vs a tagfish that was tilting (i won) and the other was my AKo allin vs 9h7h in a 3bet pot 200bb deep on a K84hh flop (i lost). the second was cool because i would never usually raise and stack off like that 200bb deep but i had been raising this tagfishes cbets all night and he had been folding so it was a great spot to setup.

long time no blog

haven't updated in a looong time. boils down to plain ol laziness.

June ended up being my best month in a looooooooooooooong time. i think i cleared 1.8k in the nl cash games mostly at 100nl and a little 200nl mixed in. it was definitely a good confidence boost to have a winning month since it had been a while.

in the beginning of july i hardly played and when i did i was dicking around with the 7game mix on ftp. it was my usual random bored with holdem lets play something else phase i go through every once in a while. i lost a few bucks playing that before i woke up and went back to taking shots at the 200nl games.

the first half of the month was a bit of a write off because i didn't have much time to play and when i did the new software update on ftp was fucking up horrendously. later in the month though when some bugs were ironed out i was grinding decently hard and although i was stuck about 1.3k for the month early and down to a 5k roll i managed to go on a nice 2.3k heater before settling down with like a 700 win for the month.

i've only played one small session this month (yesterday) and made like 370 in just a few hands playing the new ante tables that have finally made it down to the lower limits. for now it appears that a lot of these ante tables are reg filled but im really hoping some of the nittier 12 tabling regs start playing them because it will be so much more profitable for a looser player.

i must admit during the last month i was ready to move my roll off of ftp to stars but the addition of some security upgrades along with ante games and deep games will keep me there. (plus they gave me a $200 bonus for playing the shitty sw while they get the bugs out)

i also finally got a bluefirepoker membership and it's the absolute nuts. so far i'd say the nl content alone is the best on the internet bar none and im sure the plo content is just as good if not better. so far i've only watched some phil galfond and dr giggy vids but they are both extremely great teachers and i feel like im learning a ton. i also found the little bit of socalquest and samoleus content i've watched to be awesome as well.

i'll cut this post here but will update later in the week with some other thoughts on whats going on right now.

tg

playing 1/2

i've played two more sessions at 1/2 winning about 275 in the first and breaking even in the second. both sessions were about 850 hands and the second session was 6 tabling most of the time.

since reading the baluga book i feel my fundamentals are a little stronger and that 6 tabling does not cause me to horrendously spew like before. i guess thats only true for a short period of time though because my second session saw me up a couple buyins halfway through before spewing it off to break even.

lesson learned: 6 tabling can be profitable in small doses, 4 tabling is still optimal.

i also played a $24 8pm mtt on friday night while playing and busted 507/14xx runners after shipping 14bb's w/ A2s on the button over a bad players limp and the sb woke up with KK.

i plan on playing tonight and will probably play 200nl although if im feeling a bit unfocused i might just play 100nl for a bit. (been a little on the sick side last few days)

my roll is about 5.9k so everything above 5k is in action when playing 200nl and if i lose it i would probably drop to 100nl for a bit to make sure im playing good.

regards,

tg

another shot

played a shortish session on Monday night and made 400 so last night i decided to take another 1/2 shot.

i played 600 hands i think and made about 120 but also dropped 35 playing some 2/4 o8.

br is at about 5.5k right now and i'll play 1/2 again tonight.

tg

the weekend

i set a goal for myself to play 5k hands this weekend since the weather was supposed to be crappy and i didn't have anything to do.

i started off playing 1300 hands Friday nite and made $130 or something but didn't feel i played my best. i wouldn't say i played horribly but definitely not optimally.

saturday i put in 2 small 500 hands sessions making another 570 which was good for a $700 weekend.

after that my weekend got unexpectedly busy and i never got to play again. my saturday session i was a lot happier with my play. i have to remind myself sometimes not to try and be a hero and make huge calldowns since most of the time players at 100nl are not capable of making big complicated bluffs.

i also tried to play a mtt on saturday morning and just could not get into it and busted back raising AK into QQ. never know, i may try and play another tonight.

tg

lot has happened

so since my last post and lot has occurred. i continued to do well at 100nl and worked my roll up to 4.5k + 500 hundo from rb. i cashed the rb out and decided to take a shot at 200nl if there were some good games.

i found a bunch of good games but unfortunately it was a pretty wild session and i ended up dropping around $500. it didn't really bother me as i thought i played well and gave myself a 3 buyin shot and was willing to lose the money.

after that i went back to 100nl and quickly made the $500 back and was back at a 5k roll. i wasn't quite feeling up to taking another shot though so i decided to just play 100nl again. well over the last 2 nights i've played pretty poor and dropped like $750. my play the last 2 sessions has been extreeeeemeeeely spewy and both times i really needed to make a good quit but refused too.

it really sucks that i've done this to myself since i was on pace to a really good month for the first time in a long time. not sure i'll play tonight but starting tomorrow nite i'll be back to 4 tabling with intense focus and concentration. i also might try to luckbox a few mtt's this weekend as well, we'll see.

tg

first week of june

has gone well, i actually played small sessions mon-sat that put me around 4k hands for the month so far which is good for me.

i felt i was playing extremely well early in the week but started to slip later in the week. one session in particular i 6-tabled which just turned into a huge variance fest and i was happy to go back to just 4 tabling.

i played a little plo one day only because i saw scott fischman (red pro) playing some dude at .50/1 huha and i've heard he's pretty weird/spastic/not very good and he was sitting on less than a buyin so i put my name on the list just for giggles. i actually got a seat and he was sitting with 40bb and i doubled him up once in plo w/ a rundown hand that flopped tp against his pretty obvious overpair, then he won a good size pot from me in holdem before i busted him w/ a set vs over and flush draw.

im up a little over $400 for the month so far but i need to slow things down a bit for my upcoming sessions and try to keep focused. i had a really good coaching session last week where i felt much more into the discussion than ever before. my coach seemed to think i played some hands very well so that was a lot more satisfying than the usual moan when i explain a hand.

oh, and everything i said about not caring about the wsop is a complete lie, im absolutely jonesing to win a bracelet. i think part of the turnaround is the auto-bio of mike matusow that i've been reading lately where he talks a lot about the older wsops and how much it meant back then to win a bracelet. i guess nowadays it just seems to unrealistic to enter 1500 people events and believe you have a legit shot.

anyways, bracelet talk is a long ways away, for now im just going to concentrate on crushing 100nl and going robusto in the cash games.

tg

may results

unfortunately i didn't end up playing much in may. the month started off pretty slowly by playing small sessions of plo & mixed ha before getting it out of my system and making 100nl my sole game.

after that i still didn't get a lot of playing time in and then unfortunately had a death in the family that made me not want to play.

just last week i started back playing again and the results have been good. i credit the improvement in my play recently to the balugawhale book that really helped clarify a few things that i didn't understand but was trying to emulate. often times i think ssnl guys like myself see things in training videos or hear a pro say something and we implement it into our game with no understanding of why. (we also mis apply it a lot too)

i was hoping to post some hem graphs but once again my db is all messed up and missing hands for some unknown reason. the results on the month are about 8k hands played with a net profit of 700 @ 100nl and then like 150 in losses from plo at the beginning of the month.

my style has me playing 27/22 so far this month and its really fun and interesting to be in the action more rather set mining and playing 18/15.

also, wsop has started once again, every year i say that i will for sure play in next years series and then am never rolled to do so. last year i was rolled to take a shot at a smaller buyin if i wanted but was never even close to contemplating it. this year i got a slight itch and thought about possibly playing in some super sats to the main event but then realized if i win a 12k package im obv just going to take the cash and not play, so then essentially i would just be playing top heavy payout mtts. to be honest my dream of winning a bracelet is really pretty dead. when i think about my future playing poker i mostly think about playing cash games online and have no real interest in mtt's anymore. even live play is something i get an itch for once every 2 months and then wonder why i ever wasted my time. i guess the most realistic thing for my own wsop future would be to go and play some cash or something one year but even thats a stretch i think since i get so annoyed with having to deal with assholes playing live.

im hoping to continue playing well and ironing out mistakes in june. my roll is at about 4.4k right now and im toying with the idea of taking a 3 buyin shot at 1/2 once i grind it up to 5k. im also hooking back up with my coach after a couple week hiatus and im looking forward to better discussion now that i think i understand some fundamentals better.

tg

april recap / may so far

alright so april ended off kinda badly, i think i lost a couple stacks in 100nl and made maybe a little money playing huplo. i'd like get back to posting graphs but unfortunately my hem for april is all kinds of messed up with hands spread over 3 db's and all the omaha hands missing.

my estimate all tolled would be about a $300 loss on the month combined in both nl and plo games. thats obv not very good.

to start may i was really lost on what to do, can't win at nl, running good in plo but realize that its not a game that i want to play on a consistent basis. i ended up playing some 50ha and 50huplo to start the month off and was up some to start but then got kicked in the ass by some plo variance and was stuck 150 to start the month. after a tiny break and getting sick of 4 card poker i've rededicated myself to the unlimited version of hold thems.

my first couple sessions back and i've really been focused, concentrating on ranges of opponents and sticking to 2-3 tables to help keep that focus throughout a session. the other thing i've dedicated myself is not tilting. i don't often go nutso tilting smashing monitors and open shoving but i have realized that i've probably about 80% of my poker playing time this year soft tilting.

so i've been gaining a little momentum and then balugawhale's ebook came out yesterday and after reading the first 3 chapters some concepts are just soooo much more clear now that i feel like im ready to crush. this is after only 3 chapters of the basic volume so i can't imagine how good the rest must be.

look forward to reading the rest, playing a little and seeing what happens.

tg

return from sickness / shot taken

heyo, was sick as a dog for like a week and a half and still haven't fully recovered. during most of the time i was sick i stayed away from playing poker because i have zero ambition to do anything when im sick except for lay around and be sick.

i believe my first session back was thursday night and i broke even. i lost about 250 in holdem over a short period but managed to win the majority of it back playing huplo.

friday nite i played for just a bit since i was feeling a little worn out and booked another 190 win in huplo and didn't play any holdem really.

then for the first time in my life, i woke up too early on saturday morning for my golf game and had an hour to kill. so i thought i would just go 1 table some 50 plo hu as usual while i had breakfest and coffee. 10 mins into sitting down i some how see that this really bad 1/2 2/4 reg i've played with before is sitting at like 10 tables of 2/4 hu plo, hu ha and 6 max plo. a bunch of his hu tables were empty and just couldn't resist taking a shot since i fiugred his nl game is pretty weak and he must be horrible at omaha.

so i sat on 1 table of 2/4 hu ha and got stacked in the first 10 hands or so of holdem. he had opened the first 4 buttons so i decide to 3b K9s and he calls. flop is dry T42r so i cbet and he calls. turn is an offsuit J and i thought and fired again. i thought he would fold most of his pp's under a Ten at that point and maybe even a weak Ten. he calls and i spike a K on the river with only like 220 left in a 400 pot i shipped it in and he snapped me off w/ a set of 4's. i think it's a pretty standard hand that he played well and i got unlucky to hit runner runner bluff/value cards. so stuck 400 right off the bat before i decided what my stop loss was so i kept going with one more bullet.

through the omaha rounds i thought i he was playing pretty poor and i had mounted a comeback and was only down like 250 so i joined him on one of his 2/4 huplo tables as well and started 2 tabling him. i managed to work my stack up on both tables just grinding him down until we got in it on this hand:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?4155883

now stuck a 1/6th of my br i battle back and probably had the deficit down to just 400 before slipping a bit and ending the brief session 600 loser.

i wasn't really pissed at all, it was a great spot for a shot and both hands i got stacked in i think i played fine so what can you do. it was one of the rare times i've had where my poker play spawns some degeneracy. like taking a shot at 1 table at 4x the limit with a 1 bullet stop loss is no big deal really but i had in the back of my mind when i started that, i was quitting the session at 7:15am because i had to pick people up at 7:30, i was only putting one buy-in in play and i was only playing one table. at 7:30am when i finally quit i had broken all those guidelines.

yesterday afternoon i took a few minutes to play a short huplo session that ended up going longer than i wanted but was finding it hard to quit but i think i ended up losing maybe 30 or something after 2 tabling for a bit and then 1 tabling for a while. the 1 tabling match was against a decent opponent that didn't seem to have great omaha fundamentals but really adapted well and did a much better job changing gears than i did. it was a good learning session thats for sure.

gotta get back to playing holdem tonight as i don't want to venture too far off the path with plo. i think i might just play two tables for a bit and really concentrate on every decision.

i've kinda come to terms with the fact that im much better suited playing for fun rather than being the ultimate grinder thats got a sick hourly. i actually think i have a better shot of making more money playing less tables and less hours but concentrating when i do.

tg

little of each

monday i played very little but managed to bust some dudes bankroll for 190 playing huplo and then lost 60 or so in a 100 hands of nl before calling it quits cause i was on the phone and not feeling well. (good quit!)

last night i started a short session that ended up going long (for me) and played close to 1200 hands of nl and maybe another 150-200 hands of huplo. i started off with about 600 hands of nl 4 tabling and was up a bit, then played 2 tables of 50 huplo for about 20 min before just going down to 1 table cuz my mind was spinning with the 4 cards and all. i doubled a 1/2 stacker who hit-n-ran, then played a different 1/2 stacker that i built up and then eventually busted getting me to even.

i took a small break and then decided to hit the tables again and stuck to nl 4 tabling with some absolute whales. i usually just end sessions when i want regardless of how good the tables are because generally the bad players will always be there at a 100nl but i had two tables with two different guys playing 60/40 and never folding to 3-bets or cbets so i stuck around. i lost a couple decent sized pots with the one dude playing 200bb deep but eventually got some back and then stacked him 165bb deep to give me a 130 profit on the session.

the session was weird and im not sure whats happened to me but im playing this laggy 26/21 style now and it seems to fit. i don't know, maybe its just some sort of progression point that im at right now.

also sent an inquiry into why event 18 (216 huplo and 22 huplo for the mini portion) at the upcoming ftops has no satellites running. they replied that they will be up shortly and i think i'll try to grind those a little bit (esp if they are sngs) to try and make some extra coin while getting a cheaper shot at the gold!

tg

unbanned self

well the last week was another rollercoaster. i don't remember all the numbers but i dropped like 4-500 last tuesday and had another one of my stare at the wall pondering existence moments. then thursday nite i had my lesson with my new coach and i managed to run sick hot and made like 600+ in a short amount of time. on friday i played a very small session and lost 150 then saturday i sat down and put in a so so session followed by a bad one and dropped 400 again. the jury is out on how well i was playing but one of the stacks was QQ v AA bvb against a reg, again. yesterday i played a little and managed to win like 350 back which was good.

my coaching lesson was great, we came across a lot of spots and overall found a few spots where i can significantly improve upon.

now around late last week i also decided to unban myself from playing small amounts of huplo under the conditions that i only play to break up my nl sessions, i only play droolers, i only play .25/.50 stakes and i set a stop loss of a $100. also i also dug up some training videos and starting watching them to help improve my play. i believe i played a bit on friday but don't remmeber the results, on saturday i started my afternoon session dropping a $100 but then played a bit after my nl session and made just over a $100 back. yesterday while just trying to get the holdem manager features working properly i stacked some guy and then made another 100 or so after my nl session for a pretty good run.

im also excited that the ftops has gone way of the scoop and is offering a 1/10th the buyin scale series in may. (mini ftops) the result will be absolutely monster fields with good pay days and realtively low buy-ins (avg $22) and i plan on playing whatever ones are running during my cash sessions.

til next time,

tg

april so far

first off looking back at march i only lost like $300 online instead of the $700 i thought.

april so far has been ok but nothing spectacular. i think im up like $250 in nl6m but down some from small tourny buy-ins and a few hands of huplo.

plo in general is like crack cocaine for me and my first small foray into huplo was absolutely addicting until i dropped 150 last night playing some guy that sat in for $20 at a $50 table. now i have to swear off plo again for the near future if i plan to ever live a sane existence.

i have been playing quite a bit though so far this month which is good and i've kept the majority of my play to 4 tables which is ideal. i've recently made some fairly substantial changes in my pre-flop game concentrating on isolating fish and attacking tight blinds with a much higher frequency and it resulted in developing a pretty wild image. i think over my last 2500 hands i was playing 25/21 or something similar although last nites tables would not allow for such and i was back down to taggy numbers.

but in all seriousness i really just need to concentrate post flop. my major problem is i generalize post flop play way too much without regards to what villains actual range is and how he thinks. i tend to just think on auto pilot and barrell this turn or cbet this flop cuz i think i would generally fold his range to those bets. it's a compounded problem though because i think a lot of my own post flop play is somewhat irrational when facing the pfr. so when im playing against good players im misrepresenting their thinking and when im playing bad players im giving them too much credit for folding.

for the life of me i cannot do it but i need to start putting players on specific ranges and then whittle them down street by street while simultaneously evaluating my equity against the perceived range. sounds easy but 20 minutes into a session im right back to spazz click button mode.

end incoherent ramble/

in other news i've hooked up with a new coach that im really excited about. im really excited about this new opportunity but realize i need to start putting much more work in myself in order to get the full benefit of the coaching i recieve.

gonna play tonight and although i have extreme mtt jealousy right now due to the big scoop series on stars im cutting out all mtt activity for the time being as well as a self ban on any variation of 4 hole card games.

tg

V

that's what my graph would look like from the last week or so.

i took a couple unintentional days off just due to being busy, i played two sessions on sunday both going horribly and dropped $600+. i was pretty dejected from that so the next session i played i just chilled and 3 tabled 50nl and played a $24 45 man sng. i did well there making like $170 at 50nl and min cashing the sng (6/45 for like $54) over only a couple hundred hands.

last night i decided to play back at 100nl but just stick to 4 tables. i ended up 5 tabling a bit plus playing a $24 mtt and ran very well. i made like $480 in cash games and busted the mtt early in the 2nd hour when i lost a flip w/ QQ v AJss on a T hi spade draw flop.

anyways, it's a new month so another fresh start. march wasn't great but it wasn't horrible. i probably lost a little in mtts and think i lost around 700 playing cash mostly due to the 1/2 disaster but made 1.6k in live games in vegas. i guess the major downfall of march is that none of my winnings made there way back to my br :(

tg

made a video

made a 45min video of myself 6 tabling for my coach's review last night. managed to run sick good over the 450 hands and made $170.

i actually flopped a straight 3 times although i only really got paid on one and had to fold the river on the other.

hoping to play tonight.

tg

hiatus over

been a long time since posting. i said in my last post i wouldn't post again till i had some green numbers. well i've had some wins but probably still too many losses. here's a recap of the last month and a half:

• kept playing 100nl online after last post for another 2 weeks or so with mostly poor results until i had like back to back 4-5 buyin losses and decided i was done playing till my vegas trip.
• during one of those lossing sessions i decided to dick around in a $24 6max ko bounty tournament so that it would keep me interested in playing the cash tables. 5 hours later at 4am i took 3/904 ppl for 1.8k which was def a roll saver.
  
• took about a week off prior to vegas trip
• went to vegas and played mostly 1-2 (300 max bi) and 1-3 (500 max bi, i usually bought in for 400) first night in vegas im up about 400 early before i get fall down drunk and give away profits. second day i puke all day, put in a small session at night winning about 250. next day i played made like 500 or something. day after that was my biggest day building my 300 bi up to about 1.5k. last day there i drop 200 when i didn't even want to play for a grand total of 1.7k profits i think.
• unfortunately none of the profits got back into my br as i bought my gf some stuff, treated myself to some nice dinners and shopping, came home and paid some bills and poof it was gone which is fine.
• took another few days off after my trip and started back online around the middle of this month.
• felt like i had some confidence back in my game, started analyzing my leaks a little more intently and put together a nice little string of winning sessions.
• played a ton this past weekend started off playing really well i thought, picked up a few flaws in my thinking from a training video and was doing pretty well until i just started getting murdered by the deck again. i ended up playing 1/2 at a couple tables because of a huge whale and he proceeded to stack me twice, once for 150 bb's so i dumped 700 in that session only later to come back and stick to 100nl and get murdered for another 5 bi for a -1.2k day.
• also since my mtt score i've playing some of the smaller ones that won't affect me roll wise but could produce a nice payout. i haven't had much other success but the fields are usually huge so it doesn't mean much. i've also played a couple 45 man sng's which are just unbelievably juicy but haven't picked up a cash in those yet. i did play a satellite to the 750k guarantee the other day ($216 bi) and managed to cash a seat but by the time the tournament rolled around i didn't have the focus or patience to play it so i unregistered and took the converted T$ to help offset the cash losses.

that brings me up to today in which now my roll is now about 4.5k. here are my plans moving forward:

• keep grinding 100nl while playing roughly 4 tables but sometimes 6 if i can get a good seat on a fish at more than 4.
• play the occasional $26 mtt or 45/90 sng just cuz it keeps things interesting and the fields are so still super soft.
• keep up consistent coaching sessions weekly which over the last month or so hasn't happened for one reason or another.

longterm i get closer and closer to switching to stars over ftp. i think with rb on ftp i would have to be able to be a supernova on stars to make it worth while from that perspective and according to vip calculator on stars site i'd need my main game to be 6 tabling 1/2. this is a little farther off now than i thought before but maybe when i can get my roll back up to 10k or so i'll finally make the switch. the main reason for the switch would be that stars security and customer service is absolutely top notch and while i feel my money is pretty safe on ftp, i don't think it's as safe as it could be.

i'll be back to posting regularly whether it be good or bad from now on.

tg

hot n cold

hot on playing better, cold at winning monies.

played last thursday and lost 3 buy-ins ($600) and did a 2 hour coaching review after wards of all the interesting hands. we addressed a flaw in my game where i was isolating limpers a little too weakly and maybe some small pre-flop leaks i have where im under valuing suited aces and over valuing hands like 64s. other than that and one other hand i botched i think i played a pretty sound session and unfortunately had a bunch of hands where the turn was an absolute gross spot and i was forced to fold with better than 60bb's in the pot.

played again saturday morning and got stacked on some std cooler/beat, can't remember, and kept running into shitty turns a la thursdays session and lost another $300.

sunday morning i got up early to watch a footy match online and decided to play a couple $40 cap plo games while watching. i ended up losing like $180 getting it in capped 4 times, once w/ 26% equity in a 4way capped pot pre-flop against AAxx, AAxx and KKxx holding 7653 w/ 3 clubs. my equity would have been much better but all 3 villains hands had blockers to my hand. other than that i got top 2 in vs middle set as the pfr, QJ97 vs Q8xx on a Q877 board and lost to a rvr 8 and some other hand where i had 82% equity on the turn and lost.

after the game i grabbed some breakfest and played 4 tables of 100nl while paying some bills and what not. not sure how but i managed to drop another $300 when i can only remember getting stacked once. anyways, i wasn't concentrating like i should have been so i accept the fact that my play was probably sub par. i played a little last night just while messing around with my hud settings and installing some new table mods. i think i got stacked once when i had TT on a 987hh flop and got it in vs AJhh but not sure of the total damge.

on top of all that i had to cashout my rakeback money ($1700) along with another $1600 from my ftp account and have spent my few hunderd dollars of stars money on coaching so im now officially a little bit closer to rock bottom. i think my online roll now sits at like 5k, a far cry from the high water mark of 28k last summer.

plan is to grind 100nl for the rest of the month until i go to vegas Mar 5th and hopefully when i return i'll go back to playing 200nl again.

i think i'll also take a break from posting depressing results in the blog so i probably won't post until i have some green numbers to show.

tg

so i have been playing bad

really bad. after 2 sessions with my old coach he made the comment that "i look a lot like a player that he was coaching 6 months ago". (ie. me, before i started coaching with him)

i've basically gone back to all my old bad habits. one lesson i've learned from the last 6 months is this. i need a second set of eyes, experienced eyes, reviewing my play with me on a constant basis. although i try my best, i require someone to argue plays with me and challenge me to think better. it's just too easy to convince yourself the play you made is right because you have a vested interest in it being right.

so for now, im going to be working with my coach twice a week, work on getting back to playing super solid tag poker and winning all the monies!

tg

jan results

back, fully medicated and not wanting to quit pokah, kinda.

january finished up ok, my first session back after my meltdown i made 3 buy-ins and then broke even on the 31st making my total hands played 10,635 for the month. pretty low but kinda what i expected since i didn't play early in the month and then took time off mid month.

i ended up making like $225 so weeeeeeeee i didn't lose this month! that plus a $200 ironman bonus i cashed in and another $250 or so i won on stars playing ssplo while killing time on lunch. then there's rakeback but i never really keep track of that.

i had a few minutes today to sit down and play and feb sucks huge balls. in 186 hands i got my ass handed to me and lost a couple stacks (maybe multiple, i didn't look) due largely to getting set over setted twice.

my dilemma now is how much to withdraw for my trip to vegas later this month. i need to withdraw nowish cuz of the time it will take to get the cheque sent out and then my bank always puts a hold on it. with roughly 10.5k online between ftp and rakeback (using the money on stars for coaching) im kind of in a tough spot. ideally i'd like to take 5k to vegas with me so i can play some 2/5nl if i so desire but that would leave me underolled for 200nl the rest of the month. i guess i could just take out 3k which would not affect my online roll too much and then play 1/2 on the front end of my trip and then take shots at 2/5nl later in the trip when i don't have to worry about going busto.

at first i had mixed feelings about this trip for the above reasons, i hate withdrawing from online because the money never seems to get back into my account and i get frustrated when i make progrees in stakes and then have to go backwards due to outside sources. i really do not want to head back down to 100nl full time. so after a little thinking i decided that instead of playing half drunk and donking around for fun i could really grind my ass off while there and make it more of a business trip. i don't care how shitty my results have been in the last few months there is no way im a dog at the live 1/2 games and most likely a hefty fav. so if i can put in some big sessions (time wise), maybe i can use this as a bankroll booster instead of buster. i'll be there for 5 nights so thats plenty of time to make the moniez.

one other thing, i have reunited with my old coach and i feel better already after just one session. im hoping to work with him quite a bit before the vegas trip and maybe, and just maybe i can have a month reminisent (sp?) of spring/summer of 08.

tg

not. good. at. poker.

haven't played at all in the last 5-6 days and was super excited to play tonight. well within 45 min of starting my session im tilted out of my mind, got outplayed by the regs, got owned by the fish im supposed to be better than and i've come to one conclusion.

im just no good at poker. i have zero natural instinct for card games, i don't possess a fearless gamble and basically have been spinning my wheels for 4 years.

its funny because i often see people on training sites complaining about not being able to beat 25nl and shit and they've been playing for 2 years. well today i realized i am no better than them. right now i am such a huge dog to 200nl regulars it's embarassing.

the last 6 months in particular have been a vicous cycle, play a session, get raped, get pissed off and want to quit, cool down and by the next day have a renewed vigor about the game and a self assurance that i can get better. well i can't and i won't.

no amount of coaching or studying will ever turn me into a winner. im ashamed over the last few months every time someone asked me how poker is going but i deserve it because in early 08 i was taking every opportunity to let people know how well i was doing when they asked me.

i really wish i had the courage to cash out and quit. if i had some kind of other money making idea i would because i don't want to work a 9-5 the rest of my life. but i don't and the vicous cycle just keeps repeating.

tg

EDIT: day after edit, this is the kind of post that occurs when you don't take your meds and run slightly bad. i'll be back.

winners tilt

had a good session the other night managing to play 1500 hands in one sitting which is rare. the plan was to play for an hour and a half or so, go to the gym and come back and play for a bit more but i didn't feel tired or worn out and every time my tables started breaking a new fish would sit down at a bunch of tables so i kept playing.

i was doing pretty well and built up stacks on a few tables making some good reads but in the end i think i got a little sloppy with my play. i think maybe my worst form of tilt is winners tilt and i tend to go into spazz click mode when im up. i play a little spewy pre-flop at times when winning and also tend to just make plays that are unwarranted. oh, and i don't like folding to river bets either.

anyways, im going to brush up a little bit on my hu game which is kind of non-existent. back last spring sometime i was playing hu semi-regularly at 50nl and did quite well over a small sample but stopped playing just because i didn't feel i had the optimal mindset going in to hu matches. if i lost a pot or got stacked a couple times i felt like i was getting owned and would get down myself, basically taking the results personally. also, the amount of guys i would sit down with that would hit n run were absurd and it bothered me a lot. the reason i feel a need to get back into it is that the other night while playing a did a search on one of the fish at my table to find out what other tables he was on. he was playing some dude hu so i put my name on the list not expecting to get a shot at him but a couple minutes later i did. he actually had a fairly decent pre-flop game hu but his post-flop skills were severely lacking. he stacked me once early but i managed to end up a few bucks on him before quitting to call it a night.

so i think i would like to occasionally play some hu in the future when i can find a spot worth playing. i won't be making it anything close to my main game but i think often times some of the biggest fish are playing hu, taking a shot with case money and i think having some hu experience can only help my developement.

tg

decent week

felt like i played pretty well over the 2k hands or so i've played over the last week. i think i've done pretty well over that time frame results wise so it feels good to win a little bit.

saturday i played another live session and made $160 in about 5 hours of play but it was one of the live sessions that makes me never want to play live again. just a bunch of whiners with the typical "oh my god i play perfect and never win" bullshit. i busted some reg w/ AA vs AK for 60bb's and he whined about it until i left. a lot of these regs are just so horrendous i have no idea why they haven't clued in yet but i guess thats the great part about poker. i had one kid that was playing super weak tight but wouldn't shutup when it came to berating this super bad short stack player beside me. so i had to listen to them bicker back and fourth on either side of me and at that moment i thanked god for internet poker. (and partly swore at the casino for banning ipods otherwise i wouldn't have had to deal with it)

best parts of the session were:

• same donk short stacker thats arguing with weak tight calls a raise from mp in the bb with like $37 behind. flop comes QTX and he bets out $30, pfr puts the other $7 in and he folds stating he was trying to get him off 2 pair.
• weak tight won't stop bitching and whining so after i take down a pot that he obv folded in he states that his 3rd pair was huge there, i laugh and he then starts telling me how he's going to call all my raises and outplay me post flop. i could do nothing else but laugh my ass off.
• half decent (or so i thought) reg raises in the hijak, my buddy cold calls in the blinds and they take a Q73ccc flop hu. my buddy donks out, hijak min-raises and my buddy calls. turn Qx, my buddy checks, hijak bets like 1/2 pot and my buddy c/r ai for another 100 on top. hijak tanks for close to 5 minutes, keeps holding his cards up and cutting out the call. then mucks his JJ face up while declaring he guarantee's it's the best hand and there is no way he's beat. i see this about 5 times a session, "im 100% sure i've got the best hand but im gonna fold"? (my buddy had AcQx)

so it was at least a little entertaining. sometimes i wonder how much i could earn in those games if i actually played optimally while not screwing around. i'm pretty sure i could earn a living in the game but i'd also want to shoot myself. i'd also feel pretty scuzzy calling myself a 1/2 $100 cap buy-in live pro.

i also had a sick situation happen online last night. i got KK in vs AA pre again for the second time in a short little session i was playing after work. the first time i lost but the dude was only 1/2 stacked so it wasn't too bad, this time though villain was full and spiked a set on the flop. i then proceeded to hit runner runner for a straight and started to think that maybe it's my time to go on a little run. about 5 min after that the absolute biggest fish in mid/low stake nl sat down at my already decent table. this guy is down 220k over a pretty big sample playing 2/4 and 1/2! it's so sick so i had a ton of stuff to do but i felt obligated to stay and play. the wait list for the table was 49 people long! anyways i stayed for a bit, missed out on a lot of the stuff i was supposed to do but did manage to make a few bucks off him before i had to go.

im gonna try and play a lot tonight and maybe even try to luckbox a donkament.

tg

salty

haven't played a ton this month but have had some really good sessions of late. i feel like i've played some of my best sessions of the last 5 months this week. i really owe it to going back and watching the unconventional wisdom series on deucescracked which really helped me to realize how robotic/abc/face up/straight forward/auto piloty i was playing.

it's easy to think you're running bad when you truly are just playing bad. lets face it, there is no way i was just running bad over the last 5 months. my stats are reflecting the change and i had kind of become this 23/21 wanna be tag with a pretty high aggression frequency since all i ever did was bet/bet/give up or bet/bet/bet.

lately i've been back to bobbing and weaving a bit more, giving aggro players rope, squeezing value out of hands and i think making some disciplined lay downs.

so poker is looking pretty positive except one thing is missing. im pretty sure my financial results are the shits still. i've played the bulk of my 4.7k hands over the last few nights and i now realize what running bad is actually like. i guess maybe it's just a product of game selecting well and playing with a bunch of monkeys and just like the ol party poker days, sometimes they are just going to stomp you. i have no ideas what my $ numbers are because im only going to review them monthly but im hoping it's not tooooooo brutal or else i might have to grind 100nl.

on another note i stacked off w/ QQ to AA again tonight which got me to thinking about how often i seem to run monster into monster against other tag regs when battling in steal scenarios so i went back through hem and filtered my results over the last 4 months when i get JJ/QQ/KK all-in pre-flop. im down 1.8k in those scenarios so maybe it's not all my imagination.

my gf comes back tomorrow so my poker playing will be cut down but i didn't seem to play all that much more when she was gone anyways.

tg

not how you want to start

played 243 hands tonight before shutting it down due to the fact i was tilted which is good. i can be happy about that. here are the hands i got stacked on:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?3674793 - super high variance play but villain 3-bets a lot and since the rest of the table was pretty soft i expected to be there for a while and wanted to send a message to him early. his message back was "i have the nuts".

http://www.pokerhand.org/?3674813 - not a great flop and i didn't expect him to be calling too light here pre-flop. (22/18/41 over 120 hands) i put his flop raising range at JJ+,AQs,KQs,QJs,JhTh,T9s,AQo and against that range i have 44% equity so i think i played it fine.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?3674840 - villain is unknown but early reads was that he was fishy. flop kinda sucks since if he is fishy he has Ax and KJ hands in his range although probably lots of pairs and sc's as well. i really just want to get it to showdown and may bet the river if he checks a third time to try and get value out of a curios pp or 8x hand. assuming he bets the following range on the river 88,ATs+,KTs+,QTs+,JTs,AQo-ATo,KTo+,QTo+,JTo my value jam will be called by 88,AKs,KTs+,JTs,KTo+,JTo which i have 92% equity against so i think it's a pretty easy play.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?3674874 - both villains in this hand are pretty terrible and have been limp/calling a lot of flops and check/folding to lots of cbets. it's not the worst flop to cbet 3ways since i have overs + gutty + bdfd. turn jam is extremely terrible and in excusable. i'd say he's folding the turn less than 10% of the time and the turn if anything has improved him so yeah, pretty terrible. sucked even more when he started explaining to me how he was trapping me on the flop (with a gut shot). owned by a fish :(

tg

09 goals

haven't played a session yet in the new year but spent the weekend going over some possible goals for 09. i think setting goals for a full year in advance is a bit unrealistic as so many things change over the course of a year so i will set my initial goal for the first 5 months of the year.

• play on average 15k hands a month keeping it to 4 tables at a time unless a massive whale is on a bunch of tables.
• start back at 200nl (tonight) and be playing 400nl by June 1st.
• this means that i'd be winning at roughly 3bb/100 over that time which is higher than i've averaged so far (2.50bb/100 in 08) but i also plan on getting better and playing better.
• hook up with a coach and have weekly sessions.
• work harder on game away from the table more than ever before.

now there could be a few potential hickups for these plans.

• i might have to withdrawal 3k to pay off some bills
• im probably going to vegas in late february/early march and will need to withdrawal some money for that.

my roll as of right now is 8.7k on ftp and 1.3k in my rakeback account. i also have $350 on stars but i'll probably just use that to pay for coaching expenses. i treat rakeback as kind of a savings account so i do not include rake money earned into my winrate. so my hope is that i can use rakeback money to fund my vegas trip and this year i will grind my ass off while there and try to make some coin. but if i have to take 3k out sometime this month for bills it will put me below my 40 buy-in bankroll requirement for 200nl, thus meaning i'd probably have to drop to 100nl and grind back up to 8k before i could start playing 200nl again. this would set me back big time and kill my goal for june 1st.

for now, im going to stick with the goals above and if i have to i will revamp them when the time comes.

excited to play tonight after a nice little break.

tg

2008 year in review

so the graph pretty much tells the story. couldn't lose for the first half of the year, couldn't win for the second. i think i said it in a previous post but i think i must have ran very well in the first half of the year as well as made more money from playing a tighter game pre-flop which in turn puts you in better spots postflop.

i think the first half of the year i was playing a 18/15 style preflop and a real fit or fold post flop game which isn't the most profitable way to play poker but at low limits it can definitely work. the peak off the graph is when i was at 400nl and i did pretty well for my first 20k hands or so before things started to go sour. looking back now, i think the point of when i started losing was the same time i decided that i needed to open up my game. this included starting to open up more speculative hands, 3-bet more, introduce 4-bet bluffing etc.

since then i've been a steady loser not only at 400nl but 200nl as well. the thing with poker though is that it's easy to tell yourself you're just running bad but it does you no real good because before you know it, you're making bad plays and not taking responsibility for them.

take this example, i had a hand where a loose passive player limped the co and i chkd my option in the bb w/ J3o. flop is JJ8 rainbow, i lead out and he calls. turn is a small brick, i lead out again and he raises pretty much committing his stack. it's very easy to stick it in there and be shown a better Jx and chalk it up to a cooler but when you're analysing your play there is no way you can kid yourself into calling there.

so after i had opened my game up i went into a stage where i was playing scared poker. every flop i saw i convinced myself my opponent had a set, played timid and got slayed. i eventually got out of that mindset and have made great strides in my game since but i still think my game is far from great.

when i was 9 tabling the last couple days i realised that although it might be profitable, it causes me to develope bad habits and ultimately is causing a regression in my game. i love the fact that i can play 2k hand sessions but whats the point if im playing them all like garbage. i guess it's better to just play 600 hands to the best of my ability and if i can only get 12k hands in a month than so be it. this is something i've known all along but once in a while i need a reminder.

this is just one big ramble but when i look back on 08, im not going to think of it as a failure. i made money which is a lot better than a lot of people can say. my roll is slightly larger than last year but i've also cashed out upwards of 10k over the year. im dissapointed in the last 6 months though because i had so much hope back in july, i was crushing my way upward and had reached 400nl about 4 months earlier than i thought i would have. i remember signing up for a coach and stated that my goal was to be a winning regular at 400nl by the end of 08 so i guess i've missed that goal since im not playing 400nl currently but i do have a positive result lifetime at 400nl.

as for goals this year im unsure. i haven't really thought about any yet and i haven't played the last couple of days. i will probably think of some tonight and make another post about what i want out of 09 before i play my first session of the year.

tg